Rajasthan & Taj Mahal Grand Tour

A representative from Payless Tours India will be waiting in the arrivals hall of Indira Gandhi International Airport with a sign bearing your name. After a welcome garland, you meet the driver who will stay with you for the next eighteen days and transfer to your hotel, a drive of about forty minutes depending on traffic. Once you have checked in, your representative will go through the full route with you, hand over printed vouchers and contact numbers, and answer questions about money, mobile SIM cards, dress for temples and drinking water. If your flight lands early in the morning, you can rest until the afternoon tour.

In the afternoon your guide takes you to Old Delhi, the walled city built by Shah Jahan in the 1640s. You start at Jama Masjid, the largest mosque in India, whose courtyard holds around 25,000 worshippers. Climbing the southern minaret gives a wide view over the rooftops if you are comfortable with narrow steps. From the mosque steps you board a cycle-rickshaw and ride through the lanes around Chandni Chowk, where whole streets specialise in silver, wedding cards, spices or paper kites. The Red Fort faces the end of the main street; it is closed on Mondays, so your guide will plan the photo stop accordingly.

Before returning to the hotel, you can stop at Raj Ghat, the simple black marble platform on the bank of the Yamuna that marks where Mahatma Gandhi was cremated in 1948. The garden around it is quiet in the early evening and makes a calm contrast to the lanes you have just left. For dinner, your guide can suggest restaurants near Connaught Place or in your hotel, and parathas or kebabs in Old Delhi are worth trying if you are hungry earlier. Jet lag is common on the first night, so it is sensible to keep the evening simple and sleep early. Overnight stay in Delhi.

After breakfast you check out and spend the morning in New Delhi, the planned capital designed by Edwin Lutyens in the early twentieth century. The first stop is Humayun's Tomb, completed in 1570 for the second Mughal emperor by his widow. Its double dome, red sandstone frame and garden divided into four parts by water channels were copied and refined decades later in Agra. Your guide will show you the smaller tombs inside the complex, including the octagonal tomb of Isa Khan, which is older than the main building. In the morning light the gardens are usually quiet, with parakeets and squirrels more numerous than visitors.

You then drive along Kartavya Path past India Gate, the 42-metre war memorial arch, and slow down for a view of Rashtrapati Bhavan, the presidential residence with more than three hundred rooms. The final sight in Delhi is Qutub Minar, a fluted tower started in 1193 by Qutb ud-Din Aibak, the first Sultan of Delhi. Its five storeys carry bands of Arabic calligraphy cut into the stone. Beside it stands the Iron Pillar, cast around the fourth or fifth century, which has resisted rust for more than 1,600 years. Lunch can be taken at a restaurant in Mehrauli, the old village surrounding the complex.

Early in the afternoon you leave Delhi on the Yamuna Expressway, a six-lane road that reaches Agra in around three and a half to four hours. The highway passes sugarcane and wheat fields, brick kilns with tall chimneys and the new towns growing around Greater Noida. Your driver will stop at a clean roadside food court if you want tea or a break. You arrive in Agra in the late afternoon and check in. If there is enough light, a short visit to Mehtab Bagh, a Mughal garden across the river, gives you a first view of the Taj Mahal from behind. Overnight stay in Agra.

Your guide meets you in the hotel lobby before dawn and walks with you to the east gate of the Taj Mahal, where the ticket queue is shortest at this hour. Note that the monument is closed every Friday, so the dates of this tour are fixed around that. Once through the red sandstone gateway, the tomb appears framed by the arch, and in the first half hour of daylight the marble moves from blue-grey to cream. Your guide will explain the symmetry of the gardens, the four minarets that lean slightly outward to protect the tomb in an earthquake, and the Quranic verses that grow larger towards the top so they look even from below.

Back at the hotel for breakfast, you then visit Agra Fort, the red sandstone citadel begun by Akbar in 1565 and later altered by his grandson Shah Jahan, who added the white marble pavilions. You will walk through the Amar Singh Gate, the Diwan-i-Am with its long rows of arches, and the small Nagina Masjid built for the ladies of the court. The Musamman Burj, where Shah Jahan was held captive by his son Aurangzeb, has a direct line of sight to the Taj Mahal. Your guide will describe the court politics that led to his imprisonment and the eight years he spent here before his death.

Late in the morning you leave for Jaipur, stopping after about forty kilometres at Fatehpur Sikri, the capital Akbar built in the 1570s and abandoned only fourteen years later, partly because of water shortages. The palaces here are remarkably intact, including the five-storey Panch Mahal and the Diwan-i-Khas with its single carved central pillar. The adjoining mosque contains the white marble tomb of the Sufi saint Salim Chishti, where visitors tie red threads to the screens when making a wish. You then continue across the state border into Rajasthan, arriving in Jaipur in the early evening for check-in. Overnight stay in Jaipur.

Morning starts with the drive to Amber Fort, eleven kilometres north of Jaipur, which was the seat of the Kachwaha rulers until the new city was founded in 1727. The fort climbs a ridge above Maota Lake, and you reach the main gate either on foot up the paved ramp or by jeep. Inside, your guide leads you through the Diwan-i-Aam, the Ganesh Pol gateway painted with floral patterns, and the Sheesh Mahal, where convex mirror pieces set in plaster reflect candlelight across the ceiling. From the upper ramparts you can see the Jaigarh Fort walls snaking along the hills behind, built to defend Amber from above.

On the return to the city, you pause at Man Sagar Lake to photograph Jal Mahal, a palace whose lower floors are permanently under water. In the old city, painted in terracotta pink for the visit of the Prince of Wales in 1876, your guide takes you to the City Palace complex, still partly occupied by the royal family. The Mubarak Mahal displays court textiles, and the Pritam Niwas Chowk courtyard has four painted doors that represent the seasons. Next door, the Jantar Mantar observatory built by Sawai Jai Singh II holds the Samrat Yantra, a sundial whose shadow moves about six centimetres a minute.

The afternoon is kept lighter. You stop outside Hawa Mahal, the five-storey screen of pink sandstone windows built in 1799 so that royal women could watch processions unseen. Afterwards you can walk through Bapu Bazaar for printed cotton and mojari leather slippers, or Johari Bazaar for gemstones and silver, with your guide on hand to explain fair prices. Jaipur is a major centre for cutting emeralds and garnets, and many workshops will show you the polishing process. In the evening you might watch a Hindi film at the Raj Mandir cinema, a 1970s picture palace with a pink meringue interior. Overnight stay in Jaipur.

After an early breakfast you head north-west towards Bikaner, leaving behind the hills around Jaipur for the flat, sandy plains that announce the edge of the Thar Desert. The road passes through Ringas and Sikar, where farmers grow millet and gram, and around the halfway point you enter the Shekhawati region, once home to wealthy merchant families who covered their houses in frescoes. Your driver can stop at a small town such as Fatehpur or Lachhmangarh so you can see a couple of painted havelis, with scenes of gods, trains and early motor cars, and stretch your legs before the second half of the drive.

The landscape changes again as you approach Bikaner, with khejri trees, low dunes beside the road and herds of goats moving between villages. Camels pulling flat carts become a common sight. Bikaner was founded in 1488 by Rao Bika, a son of the founder of Jodhpur, and grew rich as a stop on the caravan routes that carried silk, opium and spices between Central Asia and the Gujarat coast. You arrive in the mid-afternoon and check in at your hotel, which can be a converted palace such as Laxmi Niwas or Bhanwar Niwas if you choose the heritage category.

Late in the afternoon there is time for a short walk through the old city, where narrow lanes lead past sandstone merchant houses with carved balconies. Bikaner is known across India for bhujia, a crunchy spiced snack made from moth bean flour, and for rasgulla sweets, and your driver can take you to one of the older shops in Kote Gate market to taste both. The local version of chai is often made with camel milk in desert villages, though the city shops use cow or buffalo milk. Dinner is at your hotel or a local restaurant. Overnight stay in Bikaner.

Your guide meets you after breakfast for a morning at Junagarh Fort, built between 1589 and 1594 by Raja Rai Singh, a general in Akbar's army. Unlike most Rajasthan forts, Junagarh sits on the plain rather than a hilltop, protected instead by a moat and a wall nearly a kilometre long. Inside are some of the best-preserved palace rooms in the state. The Anup Mahal is covered in red and gold lacquer work, the Badal Mahal has painted blue clouds on its walls to remind a desert ruler of rain, and one hall displays a First World War biplane gifted to Maharaja Ganga Singh.

Around thirty kilometres south lies Deshnoke and the Karni Mata temple, built in its present form in the early twentieth century with silver doors and marble carvings. The temple is dedicated to a fifteenth-century female sage believed to be an incarnation of the goddess Durga. Around twenty thousand rats live inside and are regarded as reincarnated members of her family, so they are fed milk and grain by priests and pilgrims. Shoes are removed at the entrance, so bring a pair of socks. Your guide will explain the legend and the beliefs of the Charan community who care for the temple.

On the way back to the city you can stop at the National Research Centre on Camel, the only institute of its kind in Asia. The farm breeds several Indian camel types, and in the late afternoon you can watch herds returning from grazing. A small museum explains how camels survive the desert, and the café serves camel milk ice cream and coffee. Before sunset you might visit Lalgarh Palace, the red sandstone residence built for Ganga Singh between 1902 and 1926, part of which is now a hotel and museum. Dinner is at leisure in town. Overnight stay in Bikaner.

This is one of the longest drives of the trip, so you leave Bikaner soon after breakfast. The road runs south-west through Kolayat, a pilgrimage town with a sacred lake and bathing ghats, then on through Pokaran, where the land becomes drier with each kilometre. Settlements here are small clusters of round mud huts with thatched roofs, and women in bright red and orange veils walk long distances to fetch water. Your driver knows the dhabas along this stretch and can stop for dal, roti and sweet tea around midday, which is often the best meal you will find on a desert highway.

At Pokaran you may make a brief halt at the fort, a fourteenth-century stronghold now partly converted into a hotel, which gives a first sense of the golden stone used throughout the region. As you near Jaisalmer, rows of white wind turbines line the ridges, an odd sight beside the dunes and the grazing camels. The yellow walls of Jaisalmer Fort rise from Trikuta Hill on the horizon well before you reach the town, and in the late afternoon the stone glows a deep honey colour. Your driver will bring you to your hotel for check-in by mid-afternoon.

In the evening you can walk to Gadisar Lake, a reservoir built in the fourteenth century to supply water to the city, lined with small temples and an arched gateway called Tilon ki Pol, said to have been built by a courtesan. Catfish rise to be fed at the water's edge, and local boats are available for a short row. As the sun drops, the fort walls behind you turn orange, and street vendors sell roasted peanuts and kachori along the promenade. Your hotel can arrange a dinner of desert dishes such as ker sangri, made with wild berries and beans. Overnight stay in Jaisalmer.

Jaisalmer Fort, founded in 1156 by Rawal Jaisal, is one of the few forts in the world where people still live inside the walls, around three thousand of them. With your guide you enter through four massive gateways and climb to the main square, overlooked by the seven-storey royal palace. Inside the palace museum, small windows look out across the desert in every direction. Nearby stands a group of seven Jain temples from the twelfth to fifteenth centuries, carved in fine yellow sandstone with dancers, elephants and tirthankara figures. Your guide will also point out the drainage problems that threaten the fort's foundations today.

Below the fort, the old town is filled with havelis built by merchants who grew wealthy on caravan trade. Patwon ki Haveli is actually five connected houses built over fifty years by a family of brocade traders, with sandstone facades carved as finely as wood. Salim Singh ki Haveli, belonging to a powerful prime minister, has a distinctive upper storey that curves outward like the bow of a ship. Nathmal ki Haveli was carved by two brothers, one on each side, and the two halves do not quite match. Lunch can be at a rooftop café with a view of the fort ramparts.

In the afternoon your driver takes you forty kilometres west to the Sam sand dunes, the best-known stretch of rolling sand near Jaisalmer. On the way you can stop at Kuldhara, a village abandoned overnight in the nineteenth century by its Paliwal Brahmin residents, now a field of roofless stone houses. At Sam you mount a camel for a ride across the dunes as the sun goes down, watching the sand change from gold to grey. After dark, folk musicians from the Manganiyar community often perform at camps nearby, and you can stay for dinner before returning to Jaisalmer. Overnight stay in Jaisalmer.

You leave the golden city after breakfast and head east across the desert to Jodhpur. The highway is well surfaced and the drive takes around five hours, with long, straight stretches across scrubland and the occasional chinkara gazelle near the road. Your driver can stop at Pokaran or at Balotra for tea, and in late winter you may see fields of cumin and mustard in the irrigated areas. Along the way, look out for small shrines covered in red cloth beside the road; many are dedicated to Ramdev Pir, a folk saint worshipped by Hindus and Muslims alike across western Rajasthan.

You reach Jodhpur by early afternoon and check in at your hotel. Jodhpur was founded in 1459 by Rao Jodha, chief of the Rathore clan, and became the capital of Marwar, the largest princely state in Rajputana. The city spreads out below a sheer rock outcrop crowned by Mehrangarh Fort, and many houses in the old town are painted shades of blue. Some say the colour once marked Brahmin homes, others that it helps keep homes cool or deters insects. Your guide will discuss all the theories tomorrow, but the view from your hotel terrace already shows how dense the blue quarter is.

In the late afternoon, walk with your driver or guide to the Sardar Market around the Ghanta Ghar clock tower, built in the early twentieth century by Maharaja Sardar Singh. Stalls here sell red chillies, bandhani tie-dye fabric, silver bangles and mounds of spices, and the evening crowd is mostly local. Jodhpur is famous for mirchi vada, a large green chilli stuffed with potato and fried in batter, and for makhaniya lassi, a thick sweet yogurt drink flavoured with saffron. Shri Mishrilal Hotel, just inside the market gate, has served lassi for decades. Dinner at your hotel or a rooftop restaurant facing the fort. Overnight stay in Jodhpur.

Your morning begins at Mehrangarh Fort, which rises nearly 125 metres above the city on a sheer sandstone cliff. The approach passes through seven gates, and on the Loha Pol you can see the small handprints of royal widows who committed sati in 1843. Inside, the palace rooms are kept in excellent condition by the Mehrangarh Museum Trust. Phool Mahal has gold leaf ceilings and painted panels, Moti Mahal glows with coloured glass, and the galleries hold elephant howdahs, palanquins, miniature paintings and weapons. The audio guide is among the best in India, and your local guide will add stories of the Rathore rulers who lived here.

From the fort ramparts you can see the full sweep of the blue city, and there are also zip-lining courses over the walls if you would like some extra excitement, booked separately. A short drive downhill leads to Jaswant Thada, a white marble memorial built in 1899 for Maharaja Jaswant Singh II. The thin marble panels let light glow through them, and the surrounding garden has carved gazebos and a small lake. Nearby rocky ground has been planted back with native desert plants as part of the Rao Jodha Desert Rock Park, where short walking trails explain the local flora.

After lunch you can visit Umaid Bhawan Palace, completed in 1943 and among the largest private residences in the world. Part of it is a hotel, part remains the home of the royal family, and a small museum displays vintage clocks, photographs and art deco furniture. Alternatively, walk with your guide through the lanes of the blue quarter of Brahmpuri, where you can see stepwells such as Toorji ka Jhalra, a carved eighteenth-century tank restored a few years ago and now surrounded by cafés. The evening is free to enjoy the view of the fort lit up at night. Overnight stay in Jodhpur.

After breakfast you start the drive south towards the Aravalli Hills, the oldest mountain range in India. The landscape gradually turns greener, with crops, banyan trees and small streams after the dry stretches of the past week. On the way you pass villages of the Rabari herders, recognisable by the men's white clothing and red turbans, with flocks of sheep and goats along the road. Your driver may stop at a roadside Persian wheel well, where oxen once turned a wheel to lift water for the fields, a system still found in some farms in this area.

Around midday you reach Ranakpur, set in a quiet wooded valley. The main Jain temple, dedicated to Adinath, was built in 1439 by a merchant called Dharna Shah with support from Rana Kumbha of Mewar. It is made entirely of white marble and holds 1,444 carved pillars, and it is often said that no two of them are identical. The temple opens to non-Jain visitors from around midday, and leather items, including belts and wallets, must be left at the entrance. An audio guide is available at the temple, and the Jain priests will happily explain the meaning of the carvings.

After a simple vegetarian lunch at the temple canteen or at a nearby resort, you continue through the hills to Udaipur, a drive of around two and a half hours on winding roads. As you approach the city, you pass small lakes, farming villages and marble quarries. Udaipur was founded in 1559 by Maharana Udai Singh II after Chittorgarh came under repeated attack, and its palaces and ghats are built around a series of artificial lakes. You check in at your hotel in the early evening, and there is time to walk to Gangaur Ghat to watch the lights come on across Lake Pichola. Overnight stay in Udaipur.

The morning begins at the City Palace, the largest palace complex in Rajasthan, built over nearly four hundred years by successive Maharanas of Mewar. Standing on a ridge above the east bank of Lake Pichola, the palace contains eleven smaller palaces joined together. Inside, the Mor Chowk courtyard has peacock mosaics made from coloured glass, the Zenana Mahal displays the queens' quarters, and the Crystal Gallery holds furniture made from Birmingham glass that was ordered in 1877 but never unpacked by the ruler who bought it. Your guide will explain the history of the Sisodia dynasty and their long resistance against the Mughals.

Nearby is the Jagdish Temple, an Indo-Aryan structure built in 1651 and dedicated to Vishnu, with carved elephants and musicians on its walls. Later you visit Saheliyon ki Bari, the Garden of the Maidens, laid out in the eighteenth century for the ladies of the royal household. The garden has fountains fed by gravity from Fateh Sagar Lake, marble elephants, lotus pools and shaded walkways. It is a pleasant place to rest for half an hour. Lunch can be taken at a lakeside café near Lal Ghat, where local dishes such as dal baati churma are often on the menu.

In the late afternoon you board a boat for a ride on Lake Pichola, passing the bathing ghats, the white Lake Palace on Jag Niwas Island and the City Palace from the water. The boat stops at Jag Mandir, a seventeenth-century island palace where the future Shah Jahan once sheltered while in revolt against his father. As the sun sets behind the Aravalli Hills, the light on the palaces and the water is remarkable. In the evening you can attend the Dharohar folk dance show at Bagore ki Haveli, which features puppet acts and women dancing with clay pots balanced on their heads. Overnight stay in Udaipur.

After breakfast you leave Udaipur and drive north-east through farmland and low hills to Chittorgarh, about two hours away. The fort occupies a 180-metre-high plateau above the plains and covers almost 700 acres, making it the largest fort in India and part of the Hill Forts of Rajasthan UNESCO World Heritage Site. You check in at your hotel before heading up the winding road through seven gates to the plateau. Your local guide will explain the three famous sieges of 1303, 1535 and 1568, each of which ended in jauhar, the mass self-immolation of women, and saka, the final charge of the warriors.

On the plateau you walk through the ruins of Rana Kumbha's palace, which dates from the fifteenth century, and the Fateh Prakash Palace, which houses a museum of sculpture and weapons. The nine-storey Vijay Stambha, or Tower of Victory, was built by Rana Kumbha in 1448 to mark a victory over the Sultan of Malwa, and its interior is carved with Hindu deities from bottom to top. Nearby, the smaller Kirti Stambha, a Jain tower from the twelfth century, is dedicated to Adinath. Both can be climbed with care, although the narrow stairs are steep.

Later you visit the Padmini Palace, a white building beside a pool linked to the legend of Rani Padmini, whose beauty is said to have drawn Alauddin Khalji to attack the fort in 1303. The story was told in a sixteenth-century poem and remains popular, though historians debate how much of it is true. Your guide will also show you the Meera Temple, linked to the poet-saint Meerabai, and Gaumukh Kund, a reservoir fed by a spring flowing from a carved cow's mouth. The sunset from the western ramparts over the plains is especially fine. Overnight stay in Chittorgarh.

You leave Chittorgarh after breakfast and drive north-east through the Hadoti region, an area of fields, dams and sandstone quarries. On the way you pass Menal, where a group of eleventh-century Shiva temples sits beside a gorge and seasonal waterfall, and your driver can stop for half an hour so you can walk around the carvings. The road continues across a plateau dotted with small villages, where flat-roofed houses are built from local stone slabs. You arrive in Bundi around midday and check in at a small heritage guesthouse or hotel in the old town.

Bundi has a relaxed pace, with fewer visitors and more local life than the larger cities. In the afternoon your guide takes you up to Garh Palace, built from the late sixteenth century by the Hada Chauhan rulers, which climbs the hillside above the town in a series of terraces. The highlight is the Chitrashala, a small courtyard whose rooms are covered with murals in the Bundi style, showing scenes from the life of Krishna, court festivals and hunting parties, in shades of turquoise and green. Rudyard Kipling stayed in Bundi and described the palace in his writing.

Later you walk through the old town to see some of Bundi's stepwells, of which there were once more than fifty. Raniji ki Baori, built in 1699 by a queen, descends forty-six metres with carved arches and pillars and is the most impressive. Nagar Sagar Kund, a pair of identical stepwells in the market square, is a short stroll away. As evening comes, you can climb to the ramparts of Taragarh Fort above the palace for a view of the town and Nawal Sagar lake, though monkeys can be bold here, so keep food out of sight. Overnight stay in Bundi.

After a slow breakfast you visit Sukh Mahal, a summer palace on the shore of Jait Sagar lake where Kipling is said to have begun writing his novel Kim. A short drive away, the Chaurasi Khambon ki Chhatri is a cenotaph supported by eighty-four pillars, built in 1683 by Rao Anirudh Singh for his foster brother, with carvings of elephants and deer around its base. Both sights are quiet and take about an hour together. Then you set off for Ranthambore, around three hours away, travelling through farming country, mustard and wheat fields and the cement town of Lakheri.

You arrive in Sawai Madhopur, the town nearest Ranthambore National Park, by early afternoon and check in at your lodge or resort on the edge of the forest. Most hotels here are low-rise and set in gardens where you may spot peacocks, langur monkeys and birds such as the Indian roller and treepie. Your safari permits will already have been booked in advance, as numbers are limited and demand is high from October to June. The naturalist at your lodge can give a short briefing on what to wear, the rules inside the park and the animals most often seen.

The afternoon is free to rest after the drive, or you can visit the Dastkar centre, a women's craft cooperative selling block printed textiles, embroidered cushions and patchwork made by families from villages relocated outside the park. Some of the profits support education and healthcare. Alternatively, visit the local market in Sawai Madhopur for a cup of tea. Before dinner, many lodges hold a talk or film about tiger conservation and the history of the park, which was once a royal hunting ground of the Jaipur maharajas. Make sure your camera batteries are charged and your gear packed before an early night. Overnight stay in Ranthambore.

Wake-up is before dawn for your first safari. A jeep (gypsy) collects you from your lodge and drives into the park, which covers around 1,300 square kilometres of dry deciduous forest, rocky ridges and lakes. The park is divided into zones, and your zone is allotted by the forest department. Your naturalist will read pugmarks, listen for alarm calls from chital deer and langurs, and track where tigers have been moving. Morning is often the best time for sightings, and you may also see sambar deer, wild boar, marsh crocodiles in the lakes and birds such as crested serpent eagles.

Back at the lodge for a late breakfast, you can rest through the hottest part of the day or walk around the gardens. Ranthambore Fort, a tenth-century fortress on a hill inside the park, can be visited between safaris if you want an extra outing. It is part of the UNESCO-listed Hill Forts of Rajasthan, and its Ganesh temple draws thousands of pilgrims who send wedding invitations to the god by post. From its walls the view over the jungle and lakes is very wide, and langur monkeys sit along the battlements. Lunch is at your lodge before the afternoon safari.

The afternoon safari begins around two or three o'clock depending on the season, and lasts about three and a half hours. As the heat fades, animals come to the water, and tigers sometimes rest near the lakes of Padam Talao, Rajbagh and Malik Talao, where old pavilions and ruins sit at the edge of the forest. Leopards, sloth bears and striped hyenas also live in the park, though they are seen less often. A tiger sighting can never be guaranteed, but two drives on the same day improve your chances. In the evening, share your photographs over dinner at your lodge. Overnight stay in Ranthambore.

After breakfast you start the long drive back to Delhi on the new Delhi–Mumbai Expressway, which has cut journey times considerably. The road is wide and smooth, with rest areas providing clean washrooms, food courts and fuel. Your driver will take breaks every two hours or so, and the route passes the Aravalli hills near Dausa and then the plains of Haryana. If you prefer, the journey can be done by train from Sawai Madhopur to Delhi, which takes five to six hours; let us know at the time of booking so tickets can be reserved in advance.

You reach Delhi in the afternoon and check in at your hotel near the airport or in central Delhi, depending on your flight timing. If you want some last shopping, your driver can take you to Dilli Haat, an open-air market where craftspeople from each Indian state sell their work, or to Khan Market for bookshops and cafés. Janpath, near Connaught Place, is good for low-cost souvenirs such as embroidered bags, scarves and brass items. Bargaining is normal at Janpath and Dilli Haat, while Khan Market shops have fixed prices.

In the evening you can walk in Lodhi Garden, a park filled with fifteenth-century tombs of the Sayyid and Lodi sultans where Delhi residents jog and play cricket. For a farewell dinner, Delhi has a wide choice of restaurants serving dishes from across India, from Kerala seafood to Punjabi tandoori. Your Payless Tours India representative will call to confirm your airport transfer time for the next day and check that everything went well. Use the evening to pack and reflect on the past seventeen days on the Rajasthan grand tour. Overnight stay in Delhi.

After breakfast, and depending on your flight time, your driver will transfer you to Indira Gandhi International Airport for your onward journey. If your flight is late in the evening, the hotel can usually offer a late check-out at extra cost. Our team at Payless Tours India wishes you a safe flight home.